Aston Villa’s Champions League opponents have been drawn for the competition’s league phase, including trips to Barcelona and Club Brugge plus appealing home matches against reigning European champions Paris Saint-Germain and Borussia Dortmund.Having returned to Europe’s blue-chip competition through a fourth-place Premier League finish and Europa League final triumph last season, manager Unai Emery’s side will aim to improve on their quarter-final spot in the tournament’s 2024-25 edition and create more memorable nights at Villa Park.They will also host Fenerbahce and Viking, and visit Galatasaray and Slavia Prague.Aston Villa’s fixtures* Dates of matches to be confirmed in the coming daysWhich game most excites you?With Villa having been in pot two for the draw, they will face two pot one teams in Barcelona and PSG.Undoubtedly, a first meeting with Barca since 1983 is a marquee fixture.Playing at the Camp Nou is an enormous tie, with Emery returning to the scene of the crime, having managed PSG, infamously, during that epic Champions League comeback by the Catalans in 2017. It is the type of game that enthrals Villa supporters and has the potential to have huge upside and create lasting experiences.Which match worries you?Genuinely, none of them. Villa are in the Champions League to face the best and want to face the best.This remains a hugely new and exciting experience for the supporters, so they actively want the biggest and toughest teams. They have shown before they can beat PSG at Villa Park, for example — arguably producing the peak performance of this Emery era so far in the second leg of that quarter-final 16 months ago.What is Emery’s biggest issue to confront in the tournament?How he integrates a new-look team, one that is dramatically different to his experienced warhorses of the recent past, and accrues a similar level of consistency to that previous core. Emery’s Villa have not always been spectacular but they are steady and stand up when required. For that reason, they have managed European and domestic commitments excellently for the past three seasons, getting to at least the last eight on each occasion.They will need to find that nous and know-how in defiance of the summer’s changes. Villa’s previous Champions League campaign was based on consistency in the league phase, which secured a top-eight finish and safe passage direct into the last 16. Repeating that would make life certainly easier.Aston Villa won the Europa League last season (Ozan Kose/AFP via Getty Images)Which club do Villa most want to avoid in the latter stages?Ordinarily, you would say the team who have won the previous two editions of the Champions League. Yet Villa gave PSG their toughest test en route to winning the tournament for the first time two years ago and then gave them another genuine scare, despite a weakened side, in this month’s UEFA Super Cup.Villa will be confident and ready to go toe-to-toe with just about anyone over two knockout-phase legs, particularly if the decider is bolstered by the power of Villa Park. Captain John McGinn says he expects a “difficult, transitional season” but while that may be true over the campaign as a whole, Villa tend to play up to the occasion in isolated matches — a Champions League night tends to bring the best out of them.What would be considered a successful finish?Another quarter-final would mark an excellent achievement and will have offered Villa several European trips, and hopefully more clashes with the continent’s big boys.Emery will endeavour to improve on 2024-25 and reach the final four — and at that stage, anything can happen.Villa’s pedigree might be slightly lessened in light of this summer’s raft of departures, but there will be a freshness and youthfulness to a squad who should aim to attack the competition with nothing to lose.Prediction time… how far will Villa get?Following on from my previous answer, I think they can push to reach the quarter-finals.League-phase results will obviously determine the strength of any opponents come the knockout rounds, but Villa should have enough to reach that point and, over two-legged affairs, Emery’s nous in how to control European encounters — keeping things tight on the road, while tweaking and expanding at home — will hopefully show and lead to a spot in the top eight.